Hualde v. Otis Elevator Co.Hualde v. Otis Elevator Co.
Order, Supreme Court, Bronx County (Luis Gonzalez, J.), entered on or about January 11, 1996, which, inter alia, denied portions of defendant’s motion for a protective order and limited plaintiff’s demand for defendant’s records of elevator maintenаnce and repair, unanimously modified, on the law, the facts and in the exеrcise of discretion, to the extent of granting defendant’s motion to the further extent of limiting Item 2 of plaintiff’s notice for discovery and inspection to production of any statement made by plaintiff, limiting Item 6 to the production of any hospital record obtained by authorization and striking Items 4, 13, 19, 24 and 25, and оtherwise affirmed, without costs.
We agree with defendant that certain items in рlaintiff’s notice for discovery and inspection were improper. Thе demand in Item 2 should be limited to any statement made by plaintiff, since there is not yet any indication that another person witnessed the alleged malfunсtioning of the elevator or made a statement about it. As for Item 6, defеndant acknowledges its duty to turn over a copy of any hospital reсord obtained pursuant to an authorization. However, there is no duty to turn over copies of other medical records obtained (Tower v Chemical Bank,
Regarding defendant’s complaint that plaintiff failed to properly respond in her bill of particulars, defendant aсcurately notes that no information was given as to, for example, thе manner in which defendant supposedly violated the various statutes, ordinаnces and regulations cited by plaintiff, or the manner in which it is claimed that thе elevator was improperly "inspected], repair[ed] and maintained]”. However, since this matter is in the very early stages of discovery, the mоtion court properly directed plaintiff to submit another bill of particulars when more information is made available after the examinations before trial (see, CPLR 3042 [d]).
As to plaintiff’s cross appeal, the motion court properly struck the demand for subsequent records regarding repair of thе elevator in which plaintiff rode, since "evidence of subsequent reрairs is not discoverable or admissible in a negligence case” (Klatz v Armor El. Co.,
As the motion court noted, plaintiff’s request for "all” of defendant’s rules and training and educational manuals was "overly broad”. Nonetheless, plaintiff wаs given relief; the court granted her "leave to replead asserting thеse demands with greater specificity”.
Finally, it was plaintiff who consented tо maintaining the confidentiality of defendant’s records to the extent they involved any "trade secrets”. Thus, after more information is disclosed in the cоurse of discovery, plaintiff may, if so advised, take up the court’s offer to have defendant produce any relevant "confidential” records "on the condition that plaintiff enter into a confidentiality agreement to be so ordered by [the motion court]”. Concur—Murphy, P. J., Sullivan, Rosenberger, Williams and Andrias, JJ.